Arizona academic made excuses for Hitler in 1934
Stephen H. Norwood’s new book, “The Third Reich in the Ivory Tower: Complicity and Conflict on American Campuses” (just published by Cambridge University Press) is billed as “the first systematic exploration of the nature and extent of sympathy for Nazi Germany at American universities during the 1930s.” Among other things, it contains some startling news for Arizonans.
Norwood, a history professor at the University of Oklahoma, details how, on numerous college campuses in the U.S., prominent, educated Americans who should have known better chose to become part of the Nazi propaganda machine, in spite of the road signs pointing toward the Final Solution.
The book describes the Harvard administration’s 1935 decision to permit Nazi Germany’s consul in Boston to place a wreath bearing the swastika emblem in the university’s Memorial Church, at a ceremony attended by prominent Harvard faculty members and visiting professors from Nazi Germany. It chronicles Columbia University’s determination to “preserve friendly ties with Nazi Germany” through at least 1936, and the commitment of many Seven Sisters’ administrators and faculty members to serve as cheerleaders for the Reich.
Southwest academic institutions, alas, were not immune. Norwood reports that in the summer of 1934, for the first time, a group of American faculty and students traveled around Nazi Germany under the guidance of Nazi party and government officials. The purpose of the tour was to “correct…the false attitude toward the new Germany adopted by the greater part of the American public.” (It seems the American public had grown alarmed by what they perceived as the suppression of academic freedom in Germany, including book burnings.) According to Norwood, the tour participants elected as their group leader one Homer LeRoy Shantz, president of the University of Arizona. He was the only university president on the trip.
“Upon the group’s return,” writes Norwood, “their leader, President Shantz, trumpeted Hitler’s achievements….President Shantz described German agriculture and land use ‘as the most perfect ever developed’ and marveled that ‘(t)here are not as many weeds in Germany as in 1 square mile in this country.’ He described the German people as ‘busy and active.’ They backed their Fuehrer much as Americans backed President Roosevelt. Shantz expressed his disapproval of American press coverage of Germany, explaining that it reported ‘the worst possible events.’”
A German film crew produced a propaganda movie about the trip called “Germany Today,” which was distributed free on American campuses to counteract “Jewish atrocity propaganda” in the American media. It would be interesting to watch that film today, knowing exactly who — and what — Shantz and company were making apologies for.
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24 Jul, 2009 >
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At least equally tragic was the complicity, sympathy and outright support of American academics and intellectuals in the 1930's (and beyond) for the Stalinist reign of terror - a support that was far more widespread and, unfortunately, much longer lasting than the excuses made for Hitler.
M. Patrick - 08 Sep, 2009 - 21:07:57
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